


Very Last Country Song

by LinguistLove_24



Category: Political RPF - US 21st c.
Genre: Aging, F/M, Friendship/Love, Reminiscing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-31
Updated: 2017-07-31
Packaged: 2018-12-09 09:33:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11666421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LinguistLove_24/pseuds/LinguistLove_24
Summary: "Rather than be frightened by the reminder of life's fragility and her spouse's very mortality, they hoped she would walk down her own memory lane of trials and tribulations and realise that she was stronger, together was better, and if every road led back home nobody could ever claim to have become wiser."Set 2010





	Very Last Country Song

**Author's Note:**

> I take no credit for lyrics. Those are from 'Very Last Country Song' and belong to Jennifer Nettles.

**Very Last Country Song**

 

 

 

 

 _….If life stayed the way it was,_  
_And lovers never fell out of love,_  
_If memories didn't last so long,_  
_If nobody did nobody wrong,_  
_If we knew what we had before it was gone,_  
_If every road led back home,_  
_This would be_  
_The very last country song.._

 

 

Jennifer Nettles' lyrics, sung in the soft, distinctive twang only she could do well enough to sound any semblance of pretty, wafted through the speakers of Hillary's kitchen radio. Situated at the dining table in the centre of the ample space she never seemed to get enough use of with old memories and photographs sprawled out in front of her, she shook her head lightly as it dawned on her how applicable to aspects of her own life the lyrics really were.

 

 

“What're you doin', love?” Bill drawled as he walked into the kitchen, stopping behind her chair to peer over her shoulders.

 

“Just.. reminiscing,” she told him slowly, eyes glued to a picture of Chelsea as a toddler. “Can you believe we've got one enough old enough to be getting married in less than ninety six hours?”

 

Bill shook his head. “I'm still trying to wrap my head around it.” Stepping to the side, he pulled out his own chair and sat next to his wife. “I hope she's learned from my – our,” he corrected himself, gesturing between their two bodies with a lengthy forefinger, “mistakes.”

 

“I'm quite sure she has,” Hillary told him. “She'll be taken care of.”

 

He hoped so. Everyone knew who they were. All he wanted from his future son-in-law was for him to love his daughter for the precious jewel she was, for all the love she radiated and extended from the inside.

 

_...this one here's my mama, with the long brown hair, I'm forty years older today than she was in that picture there..._

 

The song played on, and almost as if she were completely in sync with its sentiments, Hillary's eyes fell on a frayed old black and white photo of her parents. Blues bore into the photo paper for long, slow minutes as her mouth lifted into a wistful, sappy sort of smile. Time passed quicker than she – than anyone – really realised on any given day. Young morphed into old, seasons changed, babies grew up, had babies of their own. Love blossomed in all forms, sometimes fading and turning cold as winter's first frost.

 

“God, Mum was so young there,” she mused, running fingers breezily over the print.

 

She remembered then a plethora of times where Bill's actions had made her believe he'd fallen out of love with her. Looking at him now, his eyes twinkling at her in her peripheral, no one would have assumed those times to have ever passed at all. To her, it seemed like a lifetime ago, and maybe it was. But it was a lifetime she wouldn't have given up for anything. Not now, situated on the other side of the storms. She was changed, stronger, perhaps even better than she had been, for all the things that had weathered her: marriage, motherhood, politics, and everything in between.

 

“You were that young once too,” Bill joked. “Do you remember?”

 

“Oh, more than I want to,” Hillary laughed.

 

Reaching for one of her hands, he laced their fingers and squeezed. Both of them hoped that their daughter would be situated this way, too, in decades to come. Seated at a long wooden table, holding tightly to the love of her entire life as she felt his heartbeat pulsate through the tips of his fingers. Rather than be frightened by the reminder of life's fragility and her spouse's very mortality, they hoped she would walk down her own memory lane of trials and tribulations and realise that she was stronger, together was better, and if every road led back home nobody could ever claim to have become wiser. If life stayed the way it was and we all knew what we had before it was gone, it would make for the very last country song.

 


End file.
